Op-Ed: Healthcare - In The End, Negatives Outweighed Positives

Op-Ed

On Sunday, the House of Representatives voted on comprehensive health care reform legislation, marking the culmination of one of the most heated public debates in recent memory. There is no question that our health care system has serious flaws, and since the debate over reform legislation began last year, I have tried to work constructively with my colleagues to craft a bill that could expand coverage and reduce health care costs while preserving consumer choice and putting our nation on a more stable long-term fiscal footing. In the end, I believed that the reform package passed Sunday evening fell short of these goals, and consequently I was unable to support the legislation.

As a Democrat for whom the goal of expanding access to quality health care is a deeply-held core principle, I approached the debate with a belief that maintaining the status quo is not an option. With rising health care expenditures threatening the federal budget and rising premium costs overwhelming families and small businesses, it is clear that reform is necessary. However, as a lawmaker, I have a responsibility to balance that desire for meaningful reform with an objective, pragmatic assessment of the specific solutions offered.

While cable news pundits have done their best to frame the reform debate in black-or-white, all-or-nothing terms, most Marylanders I've heard from during this debate have understood that health care is too important to reduce to sound bites. Objectively, the package passed on Sunday evening was neither all good nor all bad. This legislation makes meaningful progress toward covering more people by ending pre-existing condition exclusions, preventing insurance companies from dropping you when you get sick, ending lifetime caps on care, and extending coverage of children on their parents' insurance plans through the age of 26. However, despite these positive reforms, I was unable to ignore serious concerns about the cost of the bill and its potential impact on middle class premium costs, job creation, and on our nation's long-term fiscal outlook. The $1.074 trillion cost of the bill still does not include the so-called "doctor fix", necessary to prevent drastic cuts to doctors who treat Medicare patients. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has stated that this fix, when added to the cost of reform, would significantly increase the deficit. I'm also troubled by the CBO's conclusion that this bill may increase premiums for some middle class families in non-group plans, as well as the impact that the employer mandates could have on job creation.

I will continue to work with pragmatic lawmakers in both parties to fix what I see as the shortcomings of this legislation, while preserving the positive insurance reforms. We still have a lot of work to do to ensure that health care reform is fiscally sustainable and long-term costs are reduced for families and small businesses.

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